I wrote this post for fun and I am still disobedient but pure of heart. "Knit and give" is the only dictum for the BLANKETING AMERICA campaign. Giving warmth and love with every stitch you knit. And notice I've branched out including giving scarves and now head bands to (mostly) females who will accept them. The advantage of the head band is they are very easy and so quick to knit. Together, if you will join me we can do one small stitch, knit and purl for humankind . Read on. And Merry Christmas everyone.
 |
| Here are a few more head bands |
 |
| Everyone deserves a blanket |
I have been puzzling about one of my hobbies. I knit. Big deal-- many other people knit and it doesn't even seem worthy of a post. However, and this is a big however, I knit a lot. In fact what I started doing years ago was knitting altruistically, or at least that's my excuse for the excessive amount of knitting I do. I read about this organization in which you can knit "squares", sew them into quilts and give them to homeless shelters. I thought, "ah ha, that's for me." So, I contacted them and they were fussy about the product. They wanted squares that exactly measured 7" X 9" and that was too much of a demand for me. Folks, I can't even follow a knitting pattern as it interferes with my pleasure in just knitting. My way is more loosely based on the idea of a square, somewhat free form, the process feels Zen-like, soothing. Being told what to do doesn't fit into that experience. So I knit my version of the "squares" and deliver them [unwoven into blankets or even lap rugs] to my local homeless shelter. They seem grateful to receive them and one of the women working there said, "Oh, good some of our ladies are just learning to knit." I hoped that meant that they were grateful to have the already knitted squares, and upon my suggestion, turn them into blankets.
Well, that's all it took for me to launch my new project, "Blanketing America" (trademark ) . Onward I go gleefully knitting hundreds of squares for the homeless shelter. I use mostly left over yarn from my old projects, and friends have given me their left overs. Then I am the happy recipient of yarn from the Mamas who have died leaving skein upon skein to their daughters who don't even crochet. Yarn happens. Lastly I make frequent visits to the local Thrift store for wool and yarn. What's cool about this idea for Blanketing America is there is no rule and no dictator. I could suggest that the "squares" are uniform but truly I know you could make a wonderful colorful quilt if they were odd sizes and shapes.
 |
| Just and example of one of the thousands of scarves I've made. |
I rode the ferry yesterday with a friend and she told me about a New Yorker cartoon: There's this older woman in a chair knitting, and what's spread out in front of her is a gigantic long scarf, so long that it's trailing out the door. Into that doorway comes her husband and all he says is "ENOUGH!" I'm sincerely wondering when the kindly and indulgent Mr. G is going to come to that conclusion. Another dear friend gave me a birthday card with a chubby older woman standing aside a huge knitting basket and draping down from her needles was an enormous blanket. The card said "May you have eleventy million more knitted stitches... " That's about right.
They say charity begins at home but I bet they didn't bank on odd balls like me. I decided to create a charity that has no fund raisers, no chairperson, no literature to pass out and no annual dues. The only requirement to be part of the
Blanketing America Campaign is the decision to knit and deliver the products to the homeless shelters across the country. You could even disobey the flimsy rule and hand deliver the quilts, scarves, head bands etc to homeless people on the street, perhaps with a sandwich... because I can't stand the thought of anyone in this wealthy country being cold and hungry.
The truth is I do want to Blanket America, won't you help? It is soothing and fun to boot.
susansmagicfeather copyright 2018 Susan R. Grout all rights reserved
